Biblical Hebrew Forum

[ben.crick AT argonet.co.uk (Ben Crick)]

On Tue  4 Jan 2000 (12:32:07), peter_kirk AT sil.org wrote:
> I feel that here you are trying to shelter behind the polysemy in 
> English of the word "lord", indeed trying to stretch it to cover the 
> even greater polysemy of the Hebrew BA(AL. Maybe Butterworth and Pusey 
> were trying to translate the word BA(AL consistently as "lord" 
> wherever it occurs - which even the Revised Version did not attempt 
> with this word.

 Dear Peter,

 Thanks for your input. I was hoping for more than I can find locally.
 I agree about the "even greater polysemy of the Hebrew BA(AL". But no;
 my aim was to unpack the highly compressed language of Nahum 1:2, not
 to force a uniform English equivalent for B(L.

> What do you mean by your phrase "a lord of wrath"?  Is "lord" here a 
> divine title? Presumably not, as you do not use a capital letter. Does 
> it mean "nobleman", or "one in authority", or "owner" as of slaves? 
> Does it simply mean "one in control"? And if so, do you mean that YHWH 
> controls all wrath in the world, or only his own wrath?

 IMHO a construct pair sometimes covers for a shortage of adjectives.
 So here, it might be the equivalent of "a wrathful lord"; or, a lord who
 is exceedingly angry. Luther has "ja, ein Raecher ist der HERR *und
 zornig*". YWHW is the subject of this string of attributes; HE is the One
 who is the wrathful lord. Jerome in the Vulgate has "habens furorem". The
 LXX has EKDIKWN KURIOS META QUMOU (Brenton).

 B(L is not a Divine title for YHWH (or is there an example of it as such?);
 it can mean a human husband, master, lord, landlord; or an occult entity,
 or an idol (a non-entity). So here I guess it means "masterful in his anger"?
 Not hitting out in blind rage (verse 3).
 
> I think we need to realise that in general the construct relation is 
> not always best translated into English by "X of Y". Of course such an 
> English phrase has many different meanings, not simply possessive. I 
> think that this is a case where we need to look at how the word BA(AL 
> is used in construct relationships, when the second member is an 
> abstract noun. In very many cases, including the two from Proverbs I 
> quoted, the meaning is "one characterised by", with absolutely no 
> divine overtones. The divine name Baal is used as a construct in such 
> phrases as Baal-Peor and Baal-Zebub, but the only case which is 
> anywhere near a parallel with Nahum 1:2 is Baal-Berith, Judges 8:33, 
> 9:4, which is a divine name. This would leave open the possibility 
> that Baal-Xema is a divine name and Nahum is identifying YHWH with 
> that divinity, but I don't think that one fits the context nearly as 
> well as my parallel in Proverbs.

 No, I wasn't thinking of Ba`al-Xemah as a divine entity identified here
 with YHWH; but that YHWH here characterises Himself with masterful wrath
 as an attribute, along with his judgment and justice. Still less was I
 thinking of Ba`al-Xemah as some sort of baleful occult entity locked in
 cosmic conflict with YHWH (which I took to be the thrust of the original
 enquiry). That sort of thing is found in Daniel 10:13, if anywhere.

 I'm on a learning curve myself here!

 Shalom
 Ben
-- 
 Revd Ben Crick, BA CF
 <ben.crick AT argonet.co.uk>
 232 Canterbury Road, Birchington, Kent, CT7 9TD (UK)
 http://www.cnetwork.co.uk/crick.htm